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Month: February 2014

So today I gathered some of my favorite looks coming from forever 21. They are flowy and give off a beachy- free feel to them. A boho/ Foreign look, the patterns give off a vibe as if they were inspired from some other part of the world. Also their colors go great together giving an earthy tone. Im obsessed with the laid back put togetherness of there new arrivals. If were showing skin at one coordinate were covering it up at another giving it mystery and saying something without saying much, while being stylish at the same time. As far as the trending shoes I have been loving the open heel and strap. I love The chunkiness in the heels or the platform overall look. Color wise the tan sandals and black shoes will go with everything great for those rushed mornings off to a busy day. And to feed my shopping addiction I will definitely be placing a forever 21 order tonight hehe..

(The Red Head seen in this post is My sister Kissie Smith find her on Instagram Barefooted_kid)

If your looking for something new and different then the normal movies and restaurant setting dinner then this is a great spot to venture to. Its off the Howell Mill exit in atlanta directions are on the link below. So for the first time my sister and I tried bubble tea, it was such a different concept of tea there were actual bubbles in it! To say the least we love it and not many places offer it so we always jump at the occasion. As far as style here we decided to do something a little grudge but still chic it up. We both are wearing skater skirts, or circle skirts. Kissie is wearing Dr. Martens the floral ones, they are lovely in every way:) Kissie also rocked her hippy glasses with peace sign lenses. I wore a Monster sweatshirt with my plaid shirt peeping out a the bottom with my collar to give that put together look. I love the shirts that have a statement or phrase Just written across the top, or the beanies with Meow on them or something in that manner. So there you have it an adventure and a style conquest all in one. Do your self a favor and check out this spot its totally rocking.

I had my birthday recently, Just turned twenty… Im no longer considered a teen in the eyes of the world. Though I shall always have a heart of a senior in high school, young wild and free. Any who I got some birthday Kicks to add to my collection of shoes. Some good old Dr. Martens! So here you go a little history of the stellar shoes! This shoot was actually set up on a tripod which was interesting to say the least. Check out below to be educated!

THE FULL STORY

The history of subculture is a chronicle of being different. Back in the 1950s, when the first generation of teenagers fired up a youth revolution, their goal was to look and behave differently to their parents. Previously, young people had been stylistic carbon copies of their elders. But with the advent of first-generation rock ‘n’ roll and also Teddy Boys, a generational schism cracked open that would never again be rendered shut.

On the surface, the Griggs family of Northampton in the English Midlands was seemingly a part of this reviled establishment. Making boots since 1901 in the heartland of British shoe-making, the family was successful, established, respected. Scratch the surface a little, however, and it’s clear that the Griggs clan actually possessed certain characteristics that would in the future become essential identifiers of any self-respecting youth phenomenon: they were free thinkers and they were different.

Why different? Because the Griggs family didn’t accept what had gone before as a rigid template for the future. The past was largely a reference book of ‘old’ ideas to rebel against. It was this spirit of innovation that coursed through Bill Griggs’ veins as he sat in his Cobbs Lane office one day in the late 1950s flicking through an issue of Shoe and Leather News magazine, only for his eyes to fall upon an advert by a German duo looking for overseas partners for their revolutionary new air-cushioned sole.

Munich-based Dr Maertens and his university friend Dr Funck were also different. Inventors, mavericks, free-thinkers, ditto. In response to a foot injury on a ski-ing trip, they’d invented an air-cushioned sole and were looking for like-minded innovators. Griggs contacted Dr Maertens, a name was anglicized, a plan hatched and a legend born on April 1st, 1960.

When the first pair of Dr. Martens boots rolled off the production line on that day, it was on to a British high street where youth tribes were still a rarity. Not for long: the next four decades saw the time-bomb of subculture explode across the globe as a series of tribes sprang up from their respective undergrounds, each new incarnation heralding a burning desire to be different to what had gone before.

In those early years, however, there are two distinctive and pivotal moments when Dr. Martens and youth culture became melded together, inseparably as it turned out. First up was the early skinhead, a multi-cultural, ska-loving homage to the British working classes, mimicking the dress sense of the working man with an obsessive attention to detail – style was everything. Up until then, the Dr. Martens boot had been sold mostly as reliable working men’s footwear; therefore it made the perfect choice for the skinhead. And so Dr. Martens was wrenched from the factory floor into youth culture and, for the brand, nothing would ever be the same again.

A few short and volatile years later, Pete Townshend deliberately donned a pair of black 1460s on stage with his incendiary band The Who, as an unashamed indicator of his affiliation with working class pride. When Townshend windmilled and jumped around in his DM’s, the young world watched. This was in an era of flower power and dandyish psychedelia; Townshend looked … different. Now Dr. Martens had a torch-bearer who was at the very heart of youth culture.

Townshend has said that he used to go to bed on tour with two things: ‘A cognac bottle and a Dr. Martens boot.’ This almost peculiar personal affection for the boot is not exclusive to The Who’s guitarist. It is in fact at the very core of the brand’s enduring popularity and it also ensured that over the coming decades, when each subsequent youth subculture feverishly burned the trappings of the previous ‘fashion’ or ‘movement’, they frequently saved their cherished Dr. Martens from the flames, clutching them to their collective chest. So when punks came along, angry at a lack of opportunity and defiantly individualistic, they pulled DM’s on for the battle; when Two Tone fans spent hours choosing just the right suit, a crisp and clean pair of three-hole 1461 shoes was an essential accompaniment; and when Britpop kids might have kicked against grunge’s apparent apathy, a pair of cherry red 8-holers was often the perfect companion.

Once the genie had been let out of the bottle back in the 1960s, the vapours of Dr. Martens’ rebellious spirit could not be contained and the boot seeped into every corner and crevice of youth culture. Consequently, the subcultures who have championed Dr. Martens reads like a Who’s Who’ of youth culture: skins, punks, two tone, Oi!, hardcore, psychobilly, goth, industrial, grebo, grunge, Britpop, emo … the list goes on.

Of course, Dr. Martens has not been immune to the brash self-expression of youth: so the boots are often worn with the quarters flapping open, deliberately unpolished and scuffed; or perhaps laced rigidly and precisely, with a military sheen on the toe. Maybe left plain or else customised individually … and so on. Each to their own. Each pair different. This is where that moment of magic back in late 1950s Northampton truly comes into its own – what the Griggs family created was a watershed silhouette, an off-the-shelf design classic that has quite literally allowed generation after generation to paint its own personality on to those humble uppers, sometimes literally.

With the explosion of technology in the 1990s and into the new Millennium, youth culture changed exponentially. It’s fair to say that the so-called ‘tribes’ are not so visible anymore, often populating the ether of the internet rather than the streets of the underground. Youth culture in the 21st century is a very much more complex entity, more fluid and certainly more intermingled. Some people claim ‘there are no haircuts anymore’ and in a sense that is true. But there is certainly no lack of invention, rebellion and individuality, perhaps now more than ever.

This post-modern generation is far more media-savvie than their predecessors too. They dip into a stylistic ‘Pick ‘n’ Mix’ of fashion and subcultural history to create a look, sound and lifestyle that appeals. Nothing is off limits. Inevitably, some classic looks become misappropriated and demeaned, that’s unavoidable and unpreventable. Increasingly, the brands that survive this potentially fatal mass dissemination are those that are genuine. Marketing cheque books can buy screen time or magazine space, but not authenticity. When I first met the current Dr. Martens chairman several years ago, he turned up in a scooter boy’s green parka, driving a Mini with a Union Jack on the roof and wing mirrors. Different, I thought.

The inventors of the Dr. Martens air-cushioned sole; the Griggs family; every youth subculture that has ever existed – they all have one common denominator, a primal urge to be different. Modern youth culture is now unrecognisable from the 1950s – in some ways from the 1990s even – and yet the next chapters of the history books will be written by exactly the same kind of personalities who penned the memoirs of the first fifty years of subculture. Namely people who want to be individuals, who want to be expressive, rebellious, free-thinking … different. That word again.

And when they learn from the footsteps of their predecessors and step into a future of their own making, they might just do it in a pair of Dr. Martens …

He is an awesome photographer he’s a youngin and already at art school at age 19. He attends Scad Atlanta and is majoring in Fashion Photography and minoring in Fashion. The other model in the shots is Chase Mcevers, He is going to school for photography as well. Hope you enjoyed a little taste of some work that goes on at scad:)

Today I wanted to take a skater/grudge/somewhat chic perspective. I went to forever 21 and like most times get lost then become even more lost. My findings become even more random, Then I pari all the randomness together. Why not! So today I took a Marvel Crop top from Forever 21 for 12.80. Paired it with a nylon blue high rise skirt. I wore crew socks with a pair of open toed mary janes. For another look I toped it all off with a hat from urban outfitters for 5$!

Which concludes todays simple but random outfit happy monday be as cloud minded as you want mates!